The whole corporate vision for the wonderful internet is of course as a gigantic entertainment/marketing medium:
Verizon, Comcast, Bell South and other communications giants are developing strategies that would track and store information on our every move in cyberspace in a vast data-collection and marketing system, the scope of which could rival the National Security Agency. According to white papers now being circulated in the cable, telephone and telecommunications industries, those with the deepest pockets–corporations, special-interest groups and major advertisers–would get preferred treatment. Content from these providers would have first priority on our computer and television screens, while information seen as undesirable, such as peer-to-peer communications, could be relegated to a slow lane or simply shut out.
Given our congressional representatives’ cluelessness on telecommunications issues (witness the citizen un-friendly Telecom Act of 1996) I’m thinking it’s crucial to start figuring out ways to make the decidedly un-sexy area of telecommunications legislation hot. Any ideas?
